1921-35 Silver Dollar Peace Liberty Head

This historical information is provided complements of NGC (Numismatic
Guarantee Corporation). NGC is the "grading service of choice" of the ANA
(American Numismatic Association), the largest collector oriented organization
in the United States. NGC is one of the two largest independent grading
services. NGC has been grading coins since 1987, and have graded in excess
of four million coins.

The "war to end all wars" fell far short of that noble aspiration. What
history now refers to as World War I, which ravaged Europe from 1914 to
1918, did stir worldwide yearning, however, for peace. One direct result
of that fervent hope was the League of Nations. A second, less ambitious
but equally sincere, was the Peace dollar. America shunned the League,
but warmly embraced the coin.

Following the war, there was widespread sentiment for issuance of a
coin that would celebrate and commemorate the restoration of peace. The
American Numismatic Association played a key role in fostering this proposal.
At the same time, the U. S. Mint found itself facing the need to start
producing millions of silver dollars. That need grew out of the Pittman
Act, a law enacted in 1918 at the urging of and clearly benefiting silver-mining
interests. Under this measure, the government was empowered to melt as
many as 350 million silver dollars, convert the silver into bullion and
then either sell the metal or use it to produce subsidiary silver coinage.
It also was required to strike replacement dollars for any and all that
were melted.

Aside from helping silver producers, the law also aided Great Britain,
a wartime ally at the time. During fiscal years 1918 and 1919, the U. S.
government melted a total of more than 270 million silver dollars, and
the great majority of these 259,121,554 ended up being sold in bullion
form to the British, who needed the silver to deal with a monetary crisis
in India. During that same period, the United States melted 11,111,168
silver dollars to obtain new raw material for subsidiary coins of its own.

The coins that were melted under the terms of the Pittman Act represented
nearly half the entire production of standard silver dollars (as distinguished
from Trade dollars) made by the U. S. Mint up to that date. Even so, the
loss was no particular blow to the nation's commerce. Silver dollars were
seeing only limited use, and remaining inventories were more than sufficient
to serve commercial needs. Demand for the coins was so minimal, in fact,
that none had been produced for more than a dozen years since 1904.

Against this backdrop, the Mint had no reason to strike new silver dollars
as replacements for the ones that had been melted but the Pittman Act required
it to do so. Accordingly, in 1921, after the price of silver had fallen
from postwar highs, it started cranking out the long-suspended Morgan silver
dollars once again. It did so, in fact, in record numbers: During that
single year, the various mints produced a total of more than 86 million
examples easily the highest one-year figure in the series.

By interesting coincidence, Morgan dollar production resumed on the
very same day May 9, 1921 that legislation was introduced in Congress calling
for the issuance of a new silver dollar marking the postwar peace. As described
by its sponsors in a joint resolution, the new coin would bear "an appropriate
design commemorative of the termination of the war between the Imperial
German Government and the Government of the people of the United States."

Congress adjourned without taking action on the measure. It turned out,
however, that congressional authorization wasn't really needed, since the
Morgan dollar having been produced for more than the legal minimum of 25
years was subject to replacement without specific legislative approval.

To obtain designs for the coin, the federal Commission of Fine Arts
arranged a competition involving a small group of the nation's finest medalists.
The nine invitees included such famous artists as Victor D. Brenner, Adolph
A. Weinman and Hermon A. MacNeil, all of whom had designed previous U.
S. coins. But the winner turned out to be a young Italian immigrant named
Anthony de Francisci, whose finely chiseled portrait of Liberty was modeled
after his young wife Teresa. The reverse of the coin shows an eagle in
repose atop a crag, peering toward the sun through a series of rays, with
the word PEACE superimposed on the rock. No other U. S. coin produced for
circulation has ever borne that motto.

Production of 1921 Peace dollars didn't get under way until the final
week of December, and just over a million examples were produced. It soon
became apparent that the coin's relief was too high, making it hard to
strike and causing excessive die breakage. The Mint corrected the problem
in 1922 by reducing the relief but in the process, it somewhat lowered
the coin's aesthetic appeal, as well.

By 1928, the Mint had produced enough Peace dollars to satisfy the Pittman
Act's requirements. It thereupon halted production. The lid on silver dollars
was clamped down even tighter with the onset of the Depression the following
year. The design returned for a two-year curtain call in 1934, largely
because more cartwheels were needed as backing for silver certificates.
The 1934-S proved to be one of the key coins in the series, along with
the 1921 and the 1928. The mintmark is below the word ONE on the reverse.
A handful of matte proofs exist, but only for 1921 and 1922.

Silver dollars of both designs were largely ignored by collectors until
the early 1960s, when silver certificate redemptions and the publicity
surrounding the Treasury's sales of $1,000 bags of dollars to all comers
created new interest in the large silver coins. Ironically, Peace dollars
had been readily available at banks for decades, and following Treasury
Department policy, were paid out before Morgan dollars were disbursed.
But few collectors were interested in completing sets of these relatively
expensive coins, finding it more practical to assemble collections of the
smaller denominations: A silver dollar represented a considerable sum in
the 1930s and `40s enough to buy five dozen eggs or ten boxes of Wheaties.
It wasn't until the very early 1960s, when the Treasury had almost emptied
its vaults of Peace dollars, that the more sought after Morgans started
to pour forth, fueling collector enthusiasm for both series in the process.

The entire run of Peace dollars consists of just 24 coins, none of them
great rarities. Thus, many collectors strive for complete date-and-mint
sets. Pristine, high-grade pieces are elusive, however; weak strikes were
common, and the broad, open design made the coins vulnerable to wear and
damage. Points to check for wear are Liberty's face, neck and the hair
over her ear and above her forehead. On the reverse, wear will first show
on the eagle's wing, leg and head.

The Peace dollar's early demise was ominously symbolic. Four years later,
in 1939, World War II erupted in Europe. The design came very close to
reappearing once more in 1964, when Congress authorized production of 45
million new silver dollars, apparently in an effort to serve the needs
of Nevada gambling casinos. With the smaller silver coins rapidly disappearing
from circulation, this was viewed as a gift to special interests. After
the Denver Mint produced 316,076 Peace dollars (dated 1964) in May of 1965,
the authorization was rescinded by order of President Johnson. Although
all pieces were to be recalled and melted, rumors persist of several coins
surviving.

Yeoman, R.S., A Guide Book of United States Coins, 47th Edition,
Western Publishing Co., Racine, WI, 1993.

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RISK: The purchase of coins or
bullion items are highly speculative and involves substantial risk. As in
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coin or bullion prices can be extremely volatile and will rise and fall
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Therefore, before purchasing coins or bullion, you should first have
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HOLDING PERIOD: Historically,
few coins or bullion items have appreciated dramatically in the short term.
Therefore, purchasers should recognize that
it may well be necessary for them to hold coins for a 3 - 5 year period, or
even a 5 - 10 year period, to have any chance of realizing a significant
gain.